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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29387049">We'll Run For Our Lives</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/elwinfortuna/pseuds/elwinfortuna'>elwinfortuna</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Truce of the Games - Rosemary Sutcliff</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Battle, First Kiss, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence, Reunions</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 07:54:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,547</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29387049</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/elwinfortuna/pseuds/elwinfortuna</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Amyntas fights for Athens and dreams of Leon, his competitor, his dearest friend, his enemy, his beloved.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Amyntas/Leon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Chocolate Box - Round 6</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>We'll Run For Our Lives</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverInk/gifts">SilverInk</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>The title comes from Snow Patrol's <i>Run</i>.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Athens and Sparta were at war. To Amyntas, Athens and Sparta had always been at war, and the brief respite of the Olympics Games, a little over two years before, was the only break in it he had ever known. </p><p>Everywhere he went, every battle he fought in, he could not help but look for a pair of bright eyes peering out from a helm, over a shield to block him, over a sword to kill him. Leon's face, engraved in his memory, was the one hope and the one fear of his life. </p><p>He hoped with all his heart to see Leon again, just as much as he feared that one day he would. He had seen Spartan backs in plenty as they ran from him, had killed more Spartans than he wanted to think about, but always knew that if it came to a straight fight between himself and his friend of a month, his own death would be there, for he could never bring himself to think of killing Leon, not even to save his own life. </p><p>It was an ordinary day in an ordinary war. The spring sun was westering toward sunset. A few clouds drifted overhead. The battlefield was churned with mud, for it had been raining all the last few days, and both sides were well-rested and spoiling for a fight. </p><p>In the press and thickness of battle, Amyntas fought hard. After a time, you stopped thinking about anything else, and just tried to stay alive. He was fighting on the edge of the battleground, where the mud was less thick, and some grass still survived. </p><p>He had just run one man through, and his sword caught on the edge of his opponent's tough leather jerkin. He paused to yank it away, unbalanced for a second, and out of nowhere someone sprang at him, swift as a cat, bearing him down to the ground, into the wet grass. All the light vanished as the assailant covered his head with his shield. Amyntas struggled in vain to get away, but was stopped stone-still when his enemy spoke. </p><p>"Amyntas!" a familiar voice whispered. "Amyntas, do you remember me?"</p><p>"I remember," Amyntas breathed, heart pounding fast. He would know that voice anywhere. "Leon. Leon." </p><p>"Stay still," Leon said, mouth almost at his ear. "You are safe." </p><p>It seemed an eternity that Amyntas lay there, his body warm where Leon, half atop him, pressed against him. He feared that they would be trampled in the mass, but they were not. The battle was near over, and the sound of footsteps, men struggling together, grunts of effort, and the low moans of the wounded, all seemed to grow dim in the face of Leon breathing slow and steady next to him, both of their faces hidden under Leon's shield. </p><p>After a few moments of silence, Leon spoke to him in whispers meant only for his ears. "We need to have a plan," he said, "and this is mine, if you are willing." </p><p>"Willing for what?" Amyntas answered, his head whirling. </p><p>"I cannot kill you," Leon said, and then, so soft it might have been Amyntas' own fevered imagination, "I will not. Come away with me." </p><p>"What leads a Spartan to desert a war?" Amyntas whispered, his heart beating fast with fear and hope. He was not yet altogether sure that this was not a trap. </p><p>"Nothing else but love of you," Leon answered. "We ran once against each other, let us now run together." </p><p>"I will go with you," Amyntas breathed, hope winning out, his heart now beating fast with joy. "What is your plan?" </p><p>Leon spoke quickly, soft against his ear. "It is not long now until darkness falls. By good fortune we are near the woods, and the moon rises late tonight. Get up when I tell you, and together we will slip away into the night."</p><p>"You will leave behind everything you know and are and have learned for me?" Amyntas said. "You can never return to Sparta." </p><p>"No more than you can to Athens," Leon said. "But the world is wide, and we two are strong. We'll run for our lives, and find a place somewhere that we can be together."</p><p>The moment that they abandoned the battle, the war, and their lives, was easier than Amyntas thought it would be. They simply, quickly and quietly, rose together and slipped away into the woodland. Silence fell as the clash of arms and the cries of the wounded vanished into the night. They ran together, setting an easy pace that they could keep up almost as if they were back in the Olympics running a race again. </p><p>Amyntas glanced over at Leon, taking the opportunity to have a good look at him. The boy he had known was now a man, taller but less lean, with well-developed muscles from military training. His face, though, was still that of the lad he'd met two years before. The shock of ill-groomed hair that Amyntas remembered had been replaced with a neat braid, but it was still as russet-red as ever.</p><p>Leon caught him looking and flashed a wide grin at him, gray-green eyes dancing. There was a happiness to him that shone incandescent, and Amyntas suddenly caught his breath as he realised that the happiness was because of him. Two years apart had given Leon time to think and plan, to dream a dream he had never dared hope would be fulfilled, and now it would be. </p><p>A few hours later and a good ten miles away from the battlefield, they slowed down and stopped, breathing hard. They were deep in woodland, just at the foot of a range of hills, and a small stream ran down across the rocks. It was cool and the air was sweet in the quiet night where only the music of the water could be heard. The moon was rising behind the hills.  </p><p>Amyntas did not need Leon to tell him what to do. They both pulled off their leather armour and laid their weapons down. At his belt, Amyntas wore a pouch of dried fruit. Leon had a similar pouch but his had dried meat in it. They also both carried skins of water, near empty now. </p><p>Leon held out his hand for Amyntas' waterskin, and filled them both with clear fresh water from a spring within the stream. </p><p>Meanwhile Amyntas cast around for a sheltered spot and found it among the rocks, a few steps up the hill. It was no cave, but they could hide there and be missed by anyone passing by, man or beast. Just wide enough to fit the two of them and their gear, it was an overhang with a large rock in front of it, fallen years before from the hillside. Cool grass grew in the sheltered area. </p><p>Amyntas and Leon set their shields before the opening of the shelter, planted in the ground, and their swords just within. It was never safe to be without a sword close to hand. Leon gave a waterskin to Amyntas and they both drank deep of the sweet cold water. </p><p>A few droplets lingered on Leon's face when he was done, and without much thought, Amyntas reached out, brushing them away. Leon shivered and leaned into the touch, coming closer, reaching out himself. A delicious spark seemed to set the air alight between them, and Amyntas could no longer help himself. </p><p>He did what he had been wanting to do ever since he'd looked across at Leon as they ran, and drew him close, kissing him with a fervour he had not known he possessed. Leon, for his part, kissed him back, wild and ferocious like the lion he was named for. </p><p>Another kiss followed the first, and Amyntas felt like he was drowning, getting lost in the way Leon's lips were so soft. They both staggered, sinking together to their knees, and then to the cool grass, still clothed, wrapped up in each other. </p><p>The world narrowed to only the two of them; outside of that little shelter there was suddenly nothing on earth that mattered. Amyntas, with his lips, traced a scar that ran across Leon's shoulder; Leon kissed his neck and slid a hand up under his tunic, setting his senses afire. </p><p>Slow and dreamlike, they undressed each other, pressing close together. Amyntas slid a hand down Leon's body, marveling at the scars he bore and how they made him even more beautiful. Even the scars on Leon's back, the memory of them frozen in Amyntas's mind from that long-ago day, looked beautiful to him now. Though Athenian military training was rigorous enough, it was nothing compared to what Spartans went through. </p><p>For his own part, Leon kissed the few scars that Amyntas bore.  As Amyntas's fingers traced over his skin, Leon could not help but gasp against him, draw him closer, figure out new and finer ways to tease him, new and better places to kiss him. </p><p>When they lay spent, panting and breathless together, Amyntas opened his eyes to find the sea-gray of Leon's staring back at him. "I missed your eyes," Leon said. "Those earnest brown eyes, under that dark hair.  Every night I dreamed of your eyes."</p>
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